Chapter 1 #2
Julien’s eye twitched even harder in response, the tension in the room thickening.
Sensing the need to redirect, Gabriel stepped in. “Right,” he said, clearly taking pity on our fearless leader. “The schedule. What’ve we got?”
Julien paused and took a deep breath, visibly collecting himself.
This was the same man capable of performing twelve-hour brain surgeries without breaking a sweat, yet simply being in a room with five other doctors seemed to push him to his limits.
It was clear that fatherhood and marriage had not increased his patience for chaos.
“Thank you, Gabriel,” he said tightly. “As I was saying—”
“How are the triplets?” Nathan interrupted. “Still not sleeping?”
Julien’s expression suggested he was seriously considering homicide. “They’re four months old. No, they’re not sleeping.”
“Athena still doing that crystal thing?” I asked, genuinely curious. Julien’s wife was a Wiccan who believed in the healing power of the universe, which was hilarious given that Julien believed in the healing power of peer-reviewed medical journals and nothing else.
“She has arranged rose quartz around their cribs,” Julien said, his voice flat. “For ‘peaceful energy.’”
“Is it working?” Gabriel asked.
“No.”
“Have you tried actual medicine?” Hayden suggested. “Perhaps some—”
“I am not drugging my infant children,” Julien snapped. “And before anyone suggests it, no, whiskey in their bottles is not a viable solution.”
“Worked for generations,” Fitz mumbled.
“You’re not helping.”
“I’m never helping. That’s my brand.”
Julien glanced upward, his demeanor torn between seeking divine patience and calculating the likelihood of escaping justice should he resort to violence against his colleagues. The weight of the situation was evident in his expression.
With a voice that sounded strained and dangerously close to a breakdown, Julien attempted to restore order.
“The schedule,” he began, determined to press forward.
“Monday: Nathan, you’re responsible for the Morrison follow-up at ten o’clock.
Quinton, you’ll be covering the ER until three.
Gabriel, your morning will be spent on well-child checks.
” Julien then paused, directing a look of barely concealed distaste at Fitz, our hungover OBGYN.
“Fitz, you have Mrs. Chen at eleven. Please try not to vomit on her.”
Fitz, lacking both enthusiasm and assurance, responded dryly, “No promises.”
“Tuesday,” Julien continued, determinedly ignoring him, “we have—”
The door burst open as Winnifred Potter stormed in like an avenging angel in sensible heels. She was holding a coffee cup in one hand and her phone in the other, and her expression suggested that someone was about to die.
That someone was definitely Fitz.
“You,” she said, pointing at him with her coffee cup. “Conference room. Now.”
Fitz, who had been slumped in his chair like a man accepting his fate, suddenly sat up very straight. “I’m in a meeting.”
“I don’t care if you’re performing open-heart surgery,” Winnie clipped. “We need to discuss your completely inappropriate phone call from last night.”
“I don’t remember any phone call,” Fitz said, which was possibly the worst defense in the history of defenses.
“Administrative competence?” Winnie’s voice could have cut glass. “Filing paperwork together?”
“That could mean anything,” Fitz tried.
“It means you’re an idiot,” Winnie said. “Conference room. Now. Or I’m forwarding your voicemail to HR.”
Fitz looked around the table, clearly hoping for backup. We all stared back at him with varying degrees of amusement and zero sympathy.
“You’re on your own, mate,” I said cheerfully.
“Cowards,” Fitz muttered, standing up. He swayed slightly, caught himself on the table, and then followed Winnie out of the room with all the enthusiasm of a man walking to his own execution.
The door closed behind them.
We waited exactly three seconds before Gabriel said, “He’s going to die in there.”
“Probably,” Nathan agreed. “Should we send flowers to his funeral?”
“I’m not paying for flowers,” Hayden said. “He brought this on himself.”
“Administrative competence,” I said, shaking my head. “That’s going to haunt him for years.”
“If he survives the next ten minutes,” Gabriel said.
Julien, who had been standing frozen at the head of the table during the entire exchange, slowly sat back down. He looked at his tablet. Then at us. Then back at his tablet. “The schedule,” he said weakly.
“Right,” I said, taking pity on him. “What else have we got this week?”
Julien looked at me with something that might have been gratitude. Or possibly just exhaustion. With Julien, it was hard to tell. “Wednesday,” he said, pulling up his notes. “Potential emergency surgery. Subdural hematoma. Patient is being transferred from Massachusetts General.”
“Time?” I asked.
“TBD. Depends on the transfer.”
“I can cover if you need backup,” Gabriel offered.
“Appreciated.” Julien made a note on his tablet. “Thursday and Friday are relatively light. Just the usual appointments and follow-ups.”
“Any interesting cases?” Nathan asked.
“Define interesting.”
“Anything that’s not a routine physical or a prescription refill.”
Julien scrolled through his notes. “I’ve got a consult for a possible meningioma. Hayden’s got a patient with early-stage Alzheimer’s. Gabriel’s doing a developmental assessment on a three-year-old with speech delays.”
“Riveting,” Nathan said. “I’ve got a guy coming in who thinks he has lupus because he read about it on WebMD.”
“Does he have lupus?” I asked.
“He has anxiety and too much internet access.”
“The modern plague,” Hayden observed.
From the conference room down the hall, we heard Winnie’s voice rise to a volume that suggested Fitz was not, in fact, going to survive the next ten minutes.
“Should we intervene?” Gabriel asked, though he didn’t sound particularly concerned.
“Absolutely not,” I said. “He made his bed. Now he has to lie in it.”
“While being verbally eviscerated by a woman who could probably kill him with a stapler,” Nathan added.
“It’s what he deserves,” Hayden said.
Julien looked at all of us, his expression somewhere between exasperation and resignation. “You’re all terrible people.”
“We’re doctors,” I said. “It’s in the job description.”
“That’s not—” He stopped, shook his head, and closed his tablet. “You know what? Fine. Meeting adjourned. Try not to kill any patients this week.”
“No promises,” Nathan and I said in unison.
Julien exited the room, his demeanor that of someone who had just endured a particularly grueling ordeal—he appeared as if he’d aged five years in only twenty minutes.
Gabriel trailed behind him, most likely heading off to check on his morning appointments.
Hayden, ever composed and meticulous, gathered his belongings with his characteristic precision and slipped out without saying a word.
That left only Nathan and me behind. Nathan, still grinning at his phone, seemed thoroughly entertained.
“Winnie sent me the voicemail,” he announced, holding up his phone. “Want to hear it?”
“Absolutely,” I replied without hesitation.
Nathan pressed play, and the room was instantly filled with Fitz’s slurred, off-key voice: “Winnie, Winnie, Winnie. Your eyes are like... like twin pools of... administrative competence. And I’ve been thinking about you.
In ways that would violate... several HR policies.
Maybe all of them. Want to file some paperwork together? If you know what I mean?”
There was a brief pause, and then, to our mutual horror, Fitz launched into an off-key rendition: “Turn around, bright eyes...”
Nathan stopped the recording, and we exchanged glances, both a little stunned.
“He’s never living this down,” I said, shaking my head.
“Never,” Nathan agreed, his grin widening.
Suddenly, from down the hall, a crash echoed, followed by Winnie’s furious shout: “THAT WAS MY FAVORITE MUG, YOU ABSOLUTE WALNUT.”
Nathan glanced at me. “We should probably go save him,” he suggested, though neither of us made a move to get up.
“Probably,” I agreed, still rooted to my chair.
We remained seated for another thirty seconds, listening to the ongoing chaos that was Fitz’s undoing, before finally getting to our feet.
“After you,” Nathan offered with mock courtesy.
“Age before beauty,” I shot back.
“We’re the same age,” he pointed out, rolling his eyes.
“Then beauty before... whatever you are,” I replied, unable to resist the jab.
Nathan flipped me off, and together we made our way toward the conference room, ready to rescue our hapless colleague from the wrath of the most competent woman in New Haven.
Just another Monday at Clinically Approved.
God, I loved this job.